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        <title>Ruby/DBI - Direct database access layer for Ruby</title>
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            <h1>Ruby/DBI - Direct database access layer for Ruby</h1>
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                    <h1>Links</h1>
                    <a href="index.html">Home</a>
                    <a href="http://rubyforge.org/projects/ruby-dbi">RubyForge Project</a>
                    <a href="http://ruby-dbi.rubyforge.org/rdoc/index.html">RDoc</a>
                    <a href="development.html">Developer Information</a>
                    <a href="http://www.kitebird.com/articles/ruby-dbi.html">Ruby/DBI Tutorial</a>
                    <a href="contact.html">Contact/Reporting Bugs</a>
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                <p>
                Ruby/DBI is a database interface in the spirit of Perl's prolific
                <a href="http://search.cpan.org/~timb/DBI/DBI.pm">DBI</a> authored
                by Tim Bunce.
                </p>

                <p>
                Ruby/DBI differs in quite a few ways, however. It incorporates
                many "rubyisms" while maintaining the core DBI interface, and a
                suite of commonly used DBD's are maintained with the
                application.
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                <p>
                Ruby/DBI is <i>not</i> an ORM, like <a
                    href="http://ar.rubyonrails.com">ActiveRecord</a> or <a
                    href="http://datamapper.rubyforge.org">DataMapper</a>. It is a
                lightweight, centralized API to database manipulation. An ORM may
                or may not be what you want for a given situation, due to weight,
                ease-of-use or other issues. Our goal with Ruby/DBI is to provide a
                compelling, lightweight interface that you can use for things where
                an ORM is too much or too cumbersome.
                </p>

                <p>
                Getting started with Ruby/DBI is very easy if you have a working
                knowledge of SQL and your target database. Read the <a
                    href="http://ruby-dbi.rubyforge.org/rdoc/index.html">Documentation</a>
                to get on your way!
                </p>

                <p>
                The maintainer, Erik Hollensbe, has made a commitment to
                keeping Ruby/DBI compatible with future Ruby releases. There is
                also a significant interest in enhancing the suite by further
                clarifying and enforcing the interface, and further tailoring DBI
                for the specific needs of Ruby users (as opposed to many of the
                Perlisms maintained) without impacting the goal of the project.
                There is also significant effort applied to clarifying the
                underpinnings, making debugging and development simpler.
                </p>

                <p>
                Ruby/DBI is a very old project as far as the ruby community is
                concerned, tracing back to at least 2001. There are plenty of
                people who <a
                    href="http://ruby-dbi.rubyforge.org/rdoc/index.html">have
                    contributed</a> to this effort. Big thanks to the original
                project lead, Michael Neumann, and Francis Hwang and Daniel Berger, who held the
                project in escrow for such a long time. 
                </p>
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            <div class="copyright">
                &copy;2008 Erik Hollensbe, all rights reserved. Please see the
                README file for the full copyright notice.  Please see the
                LICENSE file in the source package for information on
                redistributing the source or any of the site content.
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